Hot and sweaty exercise, breast feeding and mastitis – any links?

Exercising in the kind of heat we have just experienced can be tricky for breast feeding mums. Getting very hot and sweaty with exercise, then cooling down with airconditioning or just standing in a cool breeze, could trigger mastitis. Old wives tales of not getting a chill sometimes make more sense than we credit them with. The Chinese women I have had the privilege of learning from, believe constant temperatures and preferably keeping warm in the few weeks after birth, is important. Our breasts are sensitive to these dramatic shifts in temperature. Once again common sense prevails and our comfort comes into this. Avoid the dramatic swing from very hot to too cool after exercise.